“Your silence will not protect you” Audre Lorde
You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man’s
freedom. You can only be free if I am free. Clarence Darrow
We must indeed all hang together, or, most assuredly, we shall all hang
separately. Benjamin Franklin, July 4, 1776 Remark to John Hancock at the
signing of the Declaration of Independence
When I rise it will be with the ranks and not from the ranks. Eugene V. Debs
We must learn to live together as brothers or we are going to perish together
as fools. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Years ago I recognized my kinship with all living things, and I made up my mind
that I was not one bit better than the meanest on the earth. I said then and I
say now, that while there is a lower class. I am in it; while there is a
criminal element, I am of it; while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.
Eugene V. Debs, Founder of the American Railway Union
In Unity there is strength
We can move mountains when we’re united and enjoy life --Without unity we are
victims. Stay united. Bill Bailey, 1994
An injury to one is the concern of all! Knights of
Labor slogan
If nobody quits until I do, there will be no quitting!
UMWA organizer John R. Lawson, in 1915 after being sentenced to life
imprisonment for murder in a frame-up trial
My friends, it is solidarity of labor we want. We do
not want to find fault with each other, but to solidify our forces and say to
each other: “We must be together; our masters are joined together and we must
do the same thing.” Mother Jones, 1902 Speaking before the convention of the
UMWA, Indianapolis, IN
Then join in hand brave Americans all, By uniting we
stand, by dividing we fall. John Dickinson From The Liberty
Song
It is a great mistake for any class of laborers to isolate itself and
thus weaken the bond of brotherhood between those on whom the burdens and
hardship of labor (fall). The fortunate ones of the Earth, who are abundant in
land and money and know nothing of the anxious care and pinching poverty of the
laboring classes, may be indifferent to the appeal to justice at this point,
but the laboring classes cannot afford to be indifferent. What labor everywhere
wants, what it ought to have, and will someday demand and receive, is an honest
day’s pay for an honest day’s work. As the laborer becomes more intelligent he
will develop what capital he already possesses --that is the power to organize
and combine for its own protection. Frederick Douglass
An injury to one is the concern of all. Slogan of The Knights of Labor, circa
1880’s
Solidarity is not a matter of sentiment but a fact, cold and impassive as the
granite foundations of a skyscraper. If the basic elements, identity of interest,
clarity of vision, honesty of intent, and oneness of purpose, or any of these
is lacking, all sentimental please for solidarity, and all other efforts to
achieve it will be barren of results. Eugene V. Debs
The boss don’t listen when one guy squawks! But he’s gotta
listen when the union talks. An old song
Universal economic evils afflicting the working class can be eradicated
only by a universal working-class movement. Such a movement of the working
class is impossible while separate craft and wage agreements are made favoring
the employer against other crafts in the same industry, and while energies are
wasted in fruitless jurisdictional struggles which serve only to further the
personal aggrandizement of union officials. From the 1905 Call
to the Founding convention of the Industrial Workers of/he World.
You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man’s
freedom. You can only be free if I am free. Clarence Darrow
El pueblo unido jamas sera vencido. The people united will never be defeated
A single bracelet does not jingle Congo proverb
United jaws crush the bone Kigezi proverb, southwest
Uganda
Cross the river in a crowd and the crocodile won’t eat you. proverb
from Madagascar
The workers have nothing to lose in this but their chains. They have the world
to gain. Workers of the world unite! Karl Marx
Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an
inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Martin Luther
King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail
Am I my brother’s keeper’? [That frequently asked question] has never been
answered in a way that is satisfactory to civilized society. Yes, I am my
brother’s keeper. I am under a moral obligation to him that is inspired, not by
maudlin sentimentality, but by the higher duty I owe myself. It is when you
have done your work honestly, when you have contributed your share to the
common fund that you begin to live. Then, as Whitman said, you can take out
your soul; you can commune with yourself; you can take a comrade by the hand
and you can look into his soul and in that holy communion
you live. And if you don’t know what that is, or if you are not at least on the
edge of it, it is denied you even to look into the Promised Land. Eugene V.
Debs From a speech given at the founding of the Federal Council of Churches in
Girard, Kansas, 1908
The strongest bond of human sympathy, outside of the family relation, should be
one of uniting all working people of all nations, tongues and kindreds. From the speeches of Abraham Lincoln
In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I
didn’t speak up because lwasn’t a Communist. Then
they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they
came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade
unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up because I was
a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak
up. Martin Niemoeller, German Lutheran Pastor
(1892-1984)
In spite of petty national lines, in spite of international division lines, the
workers of the world over are coming together on the ground of their common
working class interest, without regard to race, color, creed or flag, and they
are coming together because the earth and all the earth holds, and all its
possibilities are theirs. Father Thomas Hagerty,
speaking at the Founding Convention of the I.W.W., 1905
Solidarity forever, Solidarity forever, Solidarity forever, For the union makes
us strong
When the union’s inspiration through worker’s blood shall run, There can be no
power greater anywhere beneath the sun; Yet what force on earth is weaker than
the feeble strength of one, For the union makes us strong.
Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite Who
would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might? is there anything left to us but to organize and fight? For
the union makes us strong
It is we who ploughed the prairies, built the cities where they trade, Dug the
mines and built the workshops, endless miles of railroad laid; Now we stand
outcast and starving ‘mid the wonders we have made, But the union makes us
strong
They have taken untold millions that they never toiled to earn, But without our
brain and muscle not a single wheel will turn; We can break their haughty
power, gain our freedom when we learn That the union makes us strong
In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold, Greater than
the might of armies magnified a thousandfold; We can
bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old, For the union makes us
strong. “Solidarity,” Words by Ralph Chaplin
…And I further promise to help and assist all brothers in adversity, and to
have all mine workers join the union, that we may be able to enjoy the fruits
of our labor; that I will never knowingly wrong a brother or see him wronged,
if I can prevent it. From the Obligation of Fidelity pledge taken by each
member upon joining the United Mine Workers of America. Written
in or around 1912.
The basic law of capitalism is you or I, not both you and I. Karl Liebknecht, from a speech delivered in 1907